UN court: Australia cannot use seized documents

The United Nations' highest court on Monday banned Australia from making any use of documents it seized from a lawyer working for East Timor in an arbitration case over a multibillion-dollar oil and gas deal between the two nations.

The International Court of Justice also ordered Canberra not to "interfere in any way in communications" between East Timor and its legal advisers in the arbitration or future negotiations on a maritime boundary between resources-rich Australia and its tiny, impoverished northern neighbor.

Australian agents in December raided the Canberra office of a legal adviser to East Timor and seized documents and data. That followed claims by a former Australian spy that his country bugged the East Timorese government ahead of negotiations on the Timor Sea Treaty that carves up revenue from oil and gas under the sea between the two countries.

East Timor wants to renegotiate the treaty, arguing that it is invalid because of the alleged bugging.

It went to the world court arguing the seizure was illegal. Monday's orders did not address that claim, which will be litigated later.

7 now guilty in Pendleton contractor bribery case

Two civilian defense contractors have pleaded guilty in a San Diego federal court, bringing to nine the number of defendants who have admitted guilt in recent days to their involvement in a scheme involving bribes and kickbacks at Camp Pendleton and other federal facilities.

Federal prosecutors say Paul Dana Kay of PK Excavation and Manuel Ramirez of MRN Construction, Inc., entered the pleas to violations of the Anti-Kickback Act on Friday.

Six former contractors and a former Defense Department employee have pleaded guilty in the past two weeks to involvement in the scheme.

They include Natividad Lara Cervantes, who referred to himself as "The Godfather of Camp Pendleton," and admitted accepting bribes.

Sentencing is scheduled for April. The defendants face maximums ranging from three years to 20 years in prison.

Pa. monsignor due in court after leaving prison

A Roman Catholic church official is due in court Monday for the first time since his conviction in the priest sex-abuse scandal was reversed.

Monsignor William Lynn is not quite a free man. He must remain under electronic monitoring while prosecutors try to restore the conviction.

Lynn served 18 months in prison for felony child-endangerment. He was the first U.S. church official ever convicted over his handling of abuse complaints.

Lynn says he tried to protect children as secretary for clergy in Philadelphia from 1992 to 2004, but prosecutors say he sought only to protect the church.

The 63-year-old Lynn will appear in court to review terms of his release from prison last week.

A judge says he must live in Philadelphia and report weekly to probation.

Hearing: Which court should hear coastal lawsuit?

A legal tug-of-war continues in a state levee board's lawsuit against 97 oil, gas and pipeline companies over the erosion of wetlands.

The Southeast Louisiana Flood Protection Authority-East wants U.S. District Judge Nannette Jolivette Brown to send the case back to Orleans Parish Civil District Court, where the board filed it in July.

Attorneys for Chevron USA Inc. got the lawsuit moved to federal court in August, arguing that federal laws govern many of its claims.

Since then, lawyers have filed hundreds of pages of arguments and exhibits just on the question of which court should hear the case.

Brown scheduled arguments Wednesday.

The lawsuit says oil and gas canal and pipeline work has contributed to the erosion of wetlands that protect New Orleans when hurricanes move ashore. Corrosive saltwater from a network of oil and gas access and pipeline canals has killed plants that anchored the wetlands, letting waves sweep away hundreds of thousands of coastal land, it says.

Gov. Bobby Jindal has blasted the lawsuit as a windfall for trial lawyers and his coastal protection chief, Garret Graves, said the suit would undermine Louisiana's work with the industry to rebuild wetlands. An association of state levee districts voted to oppose the suit.

Since then, however, two coastal parishes heavily dependent on the industry have filed lawsuits of their own raising similar issues.

Earlier this month, the Louisiana Oil and Gas Association sued the state's attorney general, accusing him of illegally approving the Southeast Louisiana board's contract with lawyers who filed its lawsuit.

The association contends that Buddy Caldwell had no authority to approve the contract and that the suit will have "a chilling effect on the exploration, production, development and transportation" of Louisiana's oil and gas.

German Court Begins Hearing Afghan Airstrike Case

A court in Germany has begun hearing a civil case brought by relatives of some of the 91 Afghans killed in a NATO airstrike four years ago.

Bonn regional court spokesman Philipp Prietze said Wednesday that the court reviewed video recorded by two U.S. fighter jets involved in the airstrike in the Afghan province of Kunduz on Sept. 4, 2009.

The strike was ordered by a German colonel fearful that insurgents would use two stolen fuel tankers to attack his troops.

Germany paid $5,000 each to victims' families, but some are seeking additional compensation. Most of the dead were civilians.

Separately, Germany said it would offer refuge to 182 Afghan translators and drivers who could face persecution after Western troops leave Afghanistan because they worked for the German military.

Spanish court convicts 53 in corruption trial

A Spanish court convicted 53 people Friday in the country's biggest-ever corruption trial, which lasted two years and centered on widespread real estate fraud and bribery in the southern jet-set resort town of Marbella.

The defendants in the trial, which ended last year, included former town hall officials, lawyers and business representatives. The judge took several months to decide on the sentences — 40 other people were acquitted and two accused died while the case was being prepared.

Under a highly complex scheme in the mid-1990s, city funds were widely misappropriated, and public officials and business representatives divvied up under-the table kickbacks for planning permissions and construction of hotels, residential complexes and urban infrastructure. Much of the money was then laundered with the help of lawyers.

Marbella, located on Spain's southern coast, was a magnet for jet set and society figures from across the world during the 1970s and 1980s.

The man who prosecutors said was the mastermind of the fraud, former Marbella urban planning adviser Juan Antonio Roca, got the biggest sentence — 11 years — for money laundering, bribery and fraud. He also was fined 240 million euros ($326 million).

Roca has been in jail since 2006 when he was first arrested as the case broke. Back then, he was considered one of the richest people in Spain with his assets including ranches, fighting bulls, thoroughbred horses, art, expensive cars and boats.

The scheme began when late Atletico Madrid soccer club owner Jesus Gil y Gil was mayor of Marbella between 1991 and 2002. Roca began working for Marbella town hall under Gil and claimed during the trial that he was just following the mayor's orders.

Man pleads guilty in bus stop crash that kills 4

A 24-year-old man has pleaded guilty to five felony driving under the influence counts stemming from a crash at a Las Vegas bus stop that killed four people last year.

Gary Lee Hosey Jr. awaits sentencing Nov. 1 after accepting a plea agreement with prosecutors Friday in Clark County District Court. He originally faced nine DUI counts.

The deal calls for his sentence to range from 24 to 80 years in prison.

Four people waiting at the bus stop were killed in the Sept. 13 crash. Hosey, four passengers in his car and three other people at the bus stop were injured.

A criminal complaint alleges Hosey's blood-alcohol level exceeded the legal limit of 0.08 percent when his car plowed into the bus stop.